Wanderlust
by Veranda
Summary: Well, no one ever does quite expect what they get. Rose/TenII


Title: Wanderlust

Pairings/Characters: Rose/TenII

Author's Note: Written for the Winter Ficathon at the livejournal community "doctor_rose_fix" in response to a photo prompt. I am not exactly sure what happened, but I basically looked at the picture and then lost an entire day obsessing over this fic. I'll put a link to the post at livejournal in my bio here, so please head over there if you'd like the full effect. :) And if you're on LJ, please say hi! Enjoy!

* * *

Pete Tyler's enigmatic daughter left Torchwood much the way she came—through the void—but toting the experimental dimension cannon and dry eyed, with her chin stubbornly raised. She was going to "find the Doctor." (Water cooler gossip said as much.) No one had any clue what the hell that meant, but the stars were going out, and Rose Tyler said they needed him.

Privately, it was whispered that perhaps _she_ needed him, but no one felt particularly inclined to mention this to the boss. (Anyways, it was rumored that a similarly themed row between between Mickey Smith and Ms. Tyler had been overheard by her assistant through Rose's violently slammed office door.)

For those who missed their previous run in, or doubted whether it had happened at all, Mickey and Rose did an encore performance, standing in front of the towering white wall on the top floor, the latter in blue leather, with her feet shoulder width apart, the dimension cannon's strap over one shoulder.

"You're going to get yourself killed," Mickey said, trembling.

"So?" she said, with an awful little smile, and just like that, she was gone. Off hopping through dimensions and sending back bleak, harried reports until...

nothing.

Nothing, until the stars were back. And she was back. And with her...

Well, no one ever does quite expect what they get.

* * *

A week after the rumors starting flying that Rose had come back, she and the Doctor showed up in Torchwood's sprawling cafeteria and claimed a small corner table. He peered around shyly (gawkers quickly averted their eyes) while she fetched a basket of chips, and when she sat down he folded his legs up onto the chair like a kid, already reaching for the chips. They both leaned forward, heads close together, and who knew what they were talking about, but as he spoke, with a dangerous, sly sort of grin, Rose threw her head back and laughed, and everyone did gape at them, then.

It was just...no one had ever seen her laugh like that.

* * *

Wanderlust isn't something you just grow out of. Well, I suppose you can grow out of anything, but it wasn't like they tried. Why bother? Especially when working at Torchwood lent itself so nicely to the lifestyle to which they'd grown accustomed. There was never time to lament everything they'd lost—there wasn't even time to stand still.

And besides, they'd gained a hell of a lot.

They didn't exactly spend their time hanging around Torchwood Tower. No one was sure if the Doctor actually knew where his office was—although the number of bananas in the bowl on his desk did, bafflingly, seem to vary—and when Rose's office wasn't gathering dust it tended to see less paperwork getting done and more sheepish apologies after its occupants were caught in compromising positions.

(Sooooo many positions...)

And when the two of them _did_ come stumbling into the lobby—after three weeks gone missing, or wearing little more than their shoes, or covered in slime, or with some alien that he'd convinced to come along peacefully—it was only a matter of time before they were on the way back out. Generally giggling. Frequently running. Always with his long, pretty fingers laced through hers.

(There was a rather large cash prize waiting for Pamela Jenkins, who, in the pool, was down for "they've already secretly gotten married, in some wacky alien ceremony.")

When the faraway cases came up around the long boardroom table, there was very little (if any) discussion about who would go. Suspicious poison-spewing geyser in Southern Africa? _Once, on Gorra 3, I ran into something that sounds just like...okay, when do we leave?_ Alien ship crash-landed in the arctic circle? _Taking into account my considerable experience with alien races and rather impressive aptitude for...we can?_

_...great, I'll go pack._

(And yes, there was that one dark time when she came back alone, rather alarmingly bloodstained, with a hard set to her mouth, and a certain frightening light in her eyes. She disappeared into Pete's office for over an hour, and reemerged to find half the staff waiting, armed, with a _where to, ma'am_ in their back pockets. Because they were magnificent, Rose and the Doctor, and terrible, and a matched set. Everybody knew she'd get herself killed for that man. Fuck if they were letting that happen.)

They shook it off, brushed it off, fought it down, carried on. And always running, so much running, but never running away.

* * *

It was six days on a train between Moscow and Beijing, and there were faster ways to travel (TARDIS, etc...), but gazing at Rose as he dozed off, sprawled over two seats in their noisy nook of the train car, the Doctor couldn't remember why faster was better.

Rose was stretched out opposite, her mouth working silently as she squinted at a page of a Chinese phrasebook. Her thin shirt had ridden up a bit, exposing an inch of smooth, tanned skin, and not for the first time he wished he'd insisted on a private compartment.

Eventually, she felt him staring and lazily turned her head to the side to stare back. "Hello."

He smiled. Her hair was a yellow halo, lit up where the sun streamed through the window. "Say something in Chinese," he said.

Her pink tongue appeared in the corner of her mouth as she studied the book. "Qing gei wo cai dan."

He reached out across the space between them, hooking a finger into one of her belt loops. "What's that? Sounds romantic."

He waggled his eyebrows.

"Please give me the menu," she said.

He laughed. "Yeah? And how do you say 'excuse me, we're looking for a nest of Slitheen?'"

She shifted, giggling, and closed the book, reaching down to curl her smaller hand around his. "I don't know, I think that's chapter fourteen."

"Well, plenty of time for you to get there," he said.

* * *

Later, he flagged down an attendant as asked, with a flash of those dimples, if she could track down a few glasses of champagne. She blushed and nearly tripped over her feet, babbling that she'd be right back, and Rose rolled her eyes at the Doctor, who shrugged innocently.

* * *

Night time, crossing the Gobi desert, and they were curled together on her seat now, gazing out the window. He was evenly splitting the last of the champagne between their two glasses, one held in each of her hands, and when he looked at her, their faces close together, he could see the stars outside reflected in her eyes.

She didn't look at him, just fixed her wide eyes on the universe, her cheeks flushed, and took a slow, reverent sip from the delicate flute. "You used to have...all of that," she said.

"Rose Tyler," he said, feeling her heartbeat where her back pressed against his chest. "You get so morose when you drink champagne."

She leaned back then, resting her head against his shoulder, and closed her eyes. Her hair tickled his nose maddeningly, but he didn't move. She sighed, whispered, "Traveling with you..."

"I know," he said, and finally looked out the window. Galaxies, rushing by. "Me too."**  
**


End file.
